WRITERS from North Korea

Top 5

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary North Korean Writers of all time. This list of famous North Korean Writers is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.

1. Yi Kwang-su (1892 - 1950)

With an HPI of 53.26, Yi Kwang-su is the most famous North Korean Writer.  His biography has been translated into 21 different languages on wikipedia.

Yi Gwangsu (Korean: 이광수; 1892–1950) was a Korean writer and poet, and a notable Korean independence and nationalist activist until his later turn towards collaboration with the Japanese. His pen names were Chunwon and Goju. Yi is best known for his novel Mujeong (Heartless), sometimes described as the first Korean novel. Yi Gwangsu was born Yi Bogyeong on February 1, 1892.

2. Kim Hyon-hui (1962 - )

With an HPI of 48.82, Kim Hyon-hui is the 2nd most famous North Korean Writer.  Her biography has been translated into 17 different languages.

Kim Hyon-hui (Korean: 김현희, born 27 January 1962), also known as Okhwa, is a former North Korean agent, responsible for the Korean Air Flight 858 bombing in 1987, which killed 115 people. She was arrested in Bahrain following the bombing and extradited to South Korea. There she was sentenced to death but later pardoned. North Korea denies that Kim was born in the North, and regards her entire biography to be a fabrication of the South. Some districts in Japan fund North Korean-run schools which falsely claimed that Kim was a South Korean agent. According to Kim's testimony, she was taught Japanese in connection to her mission by Yaeko Taguchi, one of at least 13 Japanese abducted by North Korea. In recent years, Kim has publicly expressed regret about the bombing and she has provided information about the state of affairs in North Korea as well as the possible state of abductees.

3. Kim Myeong-sun (1896 - 1951)

With an HPI of 46.15, Kim Myeong-sun is the 3rd most famous North Korean Writer.  Her biography has been translated into 17 different languages.

Kim Myeong-sun (Korean: 김명순; 20 January 1896 – 22 June 1951) was a female Korean novelist and poet of the early 20th century. She wrote under the art names Tansil (탄실; 彈實) and Mangyangcho (망양초; 望洋草).

4. Kim Iryeop (1896 - 1971)

With an HPI of 44.58, Kim Iryeop is the 4th most famous North Korean Writer.  Her biography has been translated into 18 different languages.

Kim Iryeop (Korean: 김일엽; Hanja: 金一葉; 28 April 1896 – 28 May 1971), also spelled Kim Iryŏp, was a South Korean writer, journalist, feminist activist, and Buddhist nun. Her given name was Kim Wonju (김원주; 金元周). Her courtesy and dharma name was Iryeop.

5. Park Yeon-mi (1993 - )

With an HPI of 29.04, Park Yeon-mi is the 5th most famous North Korean Writer.  Her biography has been translated into 24 different languages.

Yeonmi Park (Korean: 박연미; born 4 October 1993) is a North Korean defector, YouTuber, author, and American conservative activist, described as "one of the most famous North Korean defectors in the world". She fled from North Korea to China in 2007 at age 13 before moving to South Korea, then to the United States. Park made her media debut in 2011 on the show Now On My Way to Meet You, where she was dubbed "Paris Hilton" due to her stories of her family's wealthy lifestyle. She came to wider global attention after her speech at the 2014 One Young World Summit in Dublin, Ireland. Park's memoir, In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom, was published in 2015, and as of 2023 has sold over 100,000 copies. During the 2020s, she became a voice for American conservatism with speeches, podcasts and the 2023 publication of her second book, While Time Remains: A North Korean Defector's Search for Freedom in America. The authenticity of Park's claims about life in North Korea – many of which have contradicted her earlier stories and those of both her mother and fellow defectors from North Korea – have been the subject of widespread skepticism. Political commentators, journalists and professors of Korean studies have criticized Park's accounts of life in North Korea for inconsistencies, contradictory claims, and exaggerations. Other North Korean defectors, including those from the same city as Park, have expressed concern that the tendency for "celebrity defectors" to exaggerate about life in North Korea will produce skepticism about their stories. In 2014, The Diplomat published an investigation by journalist Mary Ann Jolley, who had previously worked with Park, documenting numerous inconsistencies in Park's memories and descriptions of life in Korea. In July 2023, a Washington Post investigation found there was little truth to Park's claims about life in North Korea. Park attributed the discrepancies to her imperfect memory and language skills, and her autobiography's coauthor, Maryanne Vollers, said Park was the victim of a North Korean smear campaign. Park runs the YouTube channel "Voice of North Korea by Yeonmi Park", which as of July 2023 has over one million subscribers. Her political views have been called "American conservative", and she has criticized the concepts of political correctness and woke culture in the U.S., drawing parallels between political correctness in the U.S. and North Korea.